Extra! Extra! 11/5 🥳
Hi, all, and happy Sunday.
It’s been another tough week—another week in which we could all use a reminder that, as bad it is, everything isn’t bad everywhere. So let’s take a break from calling Virginia voters (see what I did there?) and bask in the successes we enjoyed.
This is self care, friends. Let’s avail ourselves of it. The doomscrolling will be there for us when we’re done.
Sending hugs.
Jess
Read This 📖
This piece about Joe Biden’s age is beautiful and spot on.
Celebrate This! 🎉
UAW workers are on track for new contracts that will deliver the biggest pay raise they’ve received in decades!
President Biden issued a highly anticipated, sweeping executive order on artificial intelligence on Monday, focused on seizing on the emerging technology and managing its risks.
Walmart — the nation’s largest private employer — is expanding its nationwide health care coverage for employees who want doulas during pregnancy. The program is meant to address racial inequities in health care and improve the health of its workers and their babies, especially in areas where access to care may be limited.
FIFA announced that it has banned former Spanish soccer federation president Luis Rubiales for three years over violations of the organization’s disciplinary code.
The Biden administration announced it’s withholding $7.2 million from one student loan servicer after it failed to send timely statements, leading to over 830,000 missed repayments.
Scientists discovered two “pristine” coral reefs deep in the ocean. The cold-water reefs are probably thousands of years old, and can help scientists understand the ocean’s hidden diversity and deepest habitats.
Dementia risk in the West dropped 13% despite an aging population.
Walmart has announced plans to build EV charging stations at thousands of Walmart and Sam’s Club locations across the country.
After a vote by the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission, the Tolk coal plant in the Texas Panhandle will close down four years earlier than its previous retirement date.
Electric vehicle registrations grew more than any other light-duty vehicle type between 2021 and 2022.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes is investigating two Cochise County supervisors who refused to certify the county’s midterm election results by the state-required deadline.
Judge Tanya Chutkan reinstated former President Donald Trump's gag order in the Washington, D.C. election subversion case, which was placed on a temporary pause earlier this month.
A long-dormant “community solar” program could get new life after a New Orleans City Council committee—pressured by community organizers—agreed to changes that will allow developers to get a more favorable rate for solar energy in a bid to meet climate goals and help renters tap into solar benefits.
Due to conservation efforts, the number of sea turtle nests on Florida’s coasts is increasing exponentially all over the state.
President Biden unveiled a new rule proposed by the Department of Labor to close loopholes and ensure that the financial advice that Americans get for retirement is transparent. The new proposal eliminates junk fees and promotes competition within the retirement advice industry that millions of Americans count on.
Early voting was available for one week in 38 pilot jurisdictions in Michigan for the first time ever! Thanks, Democrats!
The Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged this week.
Toyota is raising the wages of its factory workers — all of them non-unionized — after the UAW strikes at General Motors, Ford and Stellantis culminated in pay hikes for unionized employees.
Some deaf children in China can hear for the first time ever after a new gene treatment.
Renewable energy broke records in Australia this fall. At one point in September, nearly all of eastern Australia’s demand could have been met by renewables — the closest to reaching 100% clean power in the grid’s history.
The Department of Energy announced a new $1.3 billion investment in three transmission lines crossing six states to deliver affordable, reliable power to households across the country, creating more than 13,000 direct and indirect high-quality local jobs – many of them union jobs.
A federal jury ruled that the powerful National Association of Realtors and several large brokerages had conspired to artificially inflate the commissions paid to real estate agents. The realtors’ group and brokerages were ordered to pay damages of nearly $1.8 billion—and that amount could swell!
A new study shows that gun violence actually IS going down and that “we have just lived through a period of enormous progress that was driven by public policy!”
D.C.’s Dulles International Airport is getting a clean- energy glow-up, thanks to a $200 million project that will add 200,000 solar panels, dozens of EVs, and numerous charging stations by 2026.
A new study shows that greenspaces could reduce gun violence. In the study, researchers saw a 12% decrease in gun violence within a half-mile radius of community greenspaces.
Legislators in the EU just voted to limit pesticide use. The environment committee voted to set binding targets that cut pesticide use in half by 2030.
An American kestrel with an injured wing is headlining art classes in Vermont and drawing crowds with his talented talons.
President Biden announced over $5 billion in investments in creating and expanding economic opportunity in rural America.
The Biden administration is encouraging the conversion of empty office space to affordable housing.
Clean energy companies have announced 211,350 jobs and counting since Congress passed President Biden’s clean energy plan.
The White House is asking Congress to approve $2.7 billion in new funding to stop illegal fentanyl at the border and to help states deal with the consequences of addiction.
President Biden and Vice President Harris announced that their Administration will develop the first-ever U.S. National Strategy to Counter Islamophobia in the United States.
The Biden Administration is also offering new resources to colleges amid a rise in antisemitism brought on by the Israel-Hamas war, including partnerships between federal and campus law enforcements to track hate speech.
President Biden announced two more Black female judicial nominees on Tuesday. Judge Julie S. Sneed, nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, and Judge Jacquelyn D. Austin, nominated to the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina, are the latest judges added to the president’s historic number of Black women nominated to the federal bench.
Eleven Asian and South American countries signed a declaration to save the world’s six surviving species of river dolphins from extinction.
School desegregation efforts in a dozen states are getting a $12.5 million infusion from the federal government as part of a new grant program meant to create more diverse schools.
Arizona will join the 16 states that have green banks.
First Solar is building a $1.1 billion solar-panel factory in Alabama in the reddest district in America.
A former Memphis police officer pleaded guilty Thursday to federal charges of violating the civil rights of Tyre Nichols, a Black man who died after a beating by police in January.
Senators Dick Durbin and Sheldon Whitehouse announced that the Senate Judiciary Committee will vote to subpoena Harlan Crow, Leonard Leo, and Robin Arkley II -- key figures in the SCOTUS corruption scandal -- to participate in the committee’s ethics investigation.
Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota signed an executive order that will open up an estimated 75% of jobs with the state to people without a bachelor's degree.
Ahead of Homecoming Weekend at HBCUs like NC Central University and North Carolina A&T University, Team Biden-Harris is launching a new ad, “Possibilities,” focused on how President Biden and Vice President Harris are investing in Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).
A panel of judges has ruled that it was unconstitutional for Republican Tennessee lawmakers to pass a state takeover of Nashville International Airport’s board without approval from city officials or voters.
The Biden-Harris Administration announced it will invest more than $653 million into port improvement projects to strengthen American supply chains.
The Michigan House of Representatives passed the Clean Energy Future bill package. It will make Michigan a national leader on clean, carbon-free, and renewable energy, provide Michiganders with more options for affordable utility bills, set up the state to capture billions in public and private funds, and drive more equitable job creation and benefits for consumers.
The Michigan legislature also passed a critical gun violence prevention bill aimed at prohibiting domestic abusers from possessing firearms.
A new line of cutting-edge smart windows could save homeowners an estimated 20% on heating and cooling costs.
A state appeals court in Missouri unanimously ruled against ballot titles for six reproductive rights proposals written by Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft (R), determining they were “replete with politically partisan language.”
In a victory for abortion rights advocates in Kansas, a judge has blocked several anti-abortion laws in the state, including a 24 hour waiting period.
Reps. Ken Buck (R-CO) and Kay Granger (R-TX) announced they would not be seeking reelection next year.
Sam Bankman-Fried, whose FTX cryptocurrency exchange collapsed last year, was found guilty on all seven charges of fraud and conspiracy.
A preservation program in Colombia, in collaboration with local fishermen communities, saw the successful return of 500 baby turtles back to the Pacific Ocean.
France has successfully brought the brown bear population in the Pyrenees Mountains from 5 up to 76, which is the highest number in the past century, through reintroduction, monitoring, and community outreach.
Indivisible National is stepping back from X!
A judge issued a preliminary finding of culpability against John Eastman at his disciplinary trial in California Bar Court.
Trials began in Colorado and Minnesota in cases brought by voters seeking to keep Trump off the ballot in 2024.
Mark Meadows’s book publisher is suing him for over a million dollars for lying about the 2020 election in his memoir.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld Illinois’s ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines — a major decision applying the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision striking down a New York gun law to uphold a different gun restriction.
ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and other major oil producers have failed to quash a lawsuit brought by the city of Honolulu in 2020 over climate misinformation, clearing the way for a trial.1
A Trump appointee to the State Department who assaulted multiple police officers at the Capitol on Jan. 6, was sentenced to nearly six years in prison Friday by a fellow veteran of the administration.
Watch This! 👀
The new forced birth anthem from Gwen Levey and The Breakdown is amazing. Thanks to the Tennessee Holler for posting!
"And hold onto the hand of your wife Jill with every scintilla of love that's between you."
~ Lucian K. Truscott IV
If only we had the eyes to see, and the heart, to place our attention on what matters. If only we would love with every scintilla of our being ... O what a world it would be.
Thank you, Jess, for sharing this beautiful article by Lucian Truscott. And thank you, Jess, for showing us love every day.
can’t imagine the research you have to do to find all of these amazing, hopeful stories. I have begun to make a ritual of reading them and then sharing with the four women in my 35 year old women’s group. we are all activists and we are being challenged mightily these days.